THE DUNGEONED ANARCHIST.
He crouches, voiceless, in his tomb-like cell,
Forgot of all things save his jailer's hate
That turns the daylight from his iron grate
To make his prison more and more a hell;
For him no coming day or hour shall spell
Deliverance, or bid his soul await
The hand of Mercy at his dungeon gate:
He would not know even though a kingdom fell!
The black night hides his hand before his eyes,—
That grim, clenched hand still burning with the sting
Of royal blood; he holds it like a prize,
Waiting the hour when he at last shall fling
The stain in God's face, shrieking as he dies:
"Behold the unconquered arm that slew a king!"
AT THE PLAY.
The poet painted a woman's soul,
Human, trusting and kind,
And then he drew the soul of a man,
Brutal and base and blind;
And the woman loved in the old, old way,
And the man in the way of men,
And the poet christened their lives "A Play,"
And he sat down to watch it, and then ...
A woman rose with a bitter laugh,
And her eyes were as dry as stone
As she bowed her head at the poet's stall
And said in a strange, cold tone: